Buenes dias, fellow travel gurus.
I am so excited to share with you all the details of our latest adventures. Warning that this is one of my longest blogs yet, so read at your leisure or just take in the most important tips and skip the rest. I do my best to fascinate all travel gurus with as much information as you’re interested in taking in. This time, we decided upon a cruise to the south Caribbean over Thanksgiving. Yes…we gave up all that family time and sleeping off the turkey on the couch time watching football and decided to travel to experience the tropical beauty of the islands. No regrets!
In fact, I’d do it again every year if I could. No spending hours prepping the bird, and all the fixins, but rather letting someone else serve me and soaking up sun and fun on a ship or an island somewhere in the Caribbean. I can’t think of a better way to celebrate Thanksgiving, actually.
So, here goes with as much detail as I can possibly share (although I hope you can get there yourselves someday).
A little background about why we decided to go to the Caribbean this year for Thanksgiving.
As you recall, Rich is a master wizard at “racking up” the flight mile points and we knew we could fly to Puerto Rico and back for no monies (a little slang used in the islands by the locals).
He was looking on Royal Caribbean site since he knew that Royal Caribbean cruise line is the ship that leaves from Puerto Rico and cruises the southern Caribbean.
Renee Moore, a travel agent with Affinity Family Travel,LLC, reached out to Rich to ask him if she could be of assistance.
Apparently, Royal Caribbean gave her our name or she had our names in her database since we worked with her for our last Royal Caribbean cruise. Rich worked with her to book the cruise for $800 per person, which is a real deal when you consider we stayed each night on the ship for 7 nights, 8 days, with all the food and drink included. Of course, specialty drinks, alcoholic drinks and specialty coffees, teas, etc., are extra. You can drink all the water, juice, iced tea and regular coffee, tea, and hot chocolate without any charge and all the food you want except for the specialty cafes and shops, such as Johnny Rockets, and the specialty restaurants, but there is a large dining area for buffets with all kinds of food any time of the day and the dining rooms where you can sit and be served by waiters during breakfast, lunch and dinner. For every port of call, you have the option to do whatever you want, including a number of excursions, which also cost anywhere from $50-$200 per person. There are probably others you can do for more money, but I don’t even consider those.
Going through Renee, we were provided with $250 onboard ship credit, which we used toward our excursions, detailed below. BTW, we travelled on Freedom onf the Seas. It was once the largest ship on the sea with capacity of approx.. 4,000 passengers. Seemed like we were at full capacity for this trip.
Day 1:
Arrived on ship mid-afternoon and did a lot of exploring. Had our first dinner aboard and then and our first show. Sailed from port at 8:30 p.m.
Day 2:
St Maarten
Early morning arrival. I planned an 11 a.m excursion for horsebackriding-$109, including the transportation to the horseback riding site and a free rum punch after the ride. There were only five of us on this ride. At the end of the ride, we all took off our shoes and rode our horses into the ocean from the beach. You’ll note a few of my pics from that excursion. My new friend, Tessa, and her daughter and I split the cost of the pictures and it cost us $20 per person, a total of $40 for all the pics split between Tessa and myself.
Rich went to the beach for the day and walked there. He spent $$20 for 2 chairs and an umbrella.
Day 3:
St. Kitts/Nevis
Early morning arrival. No excursions planned for this day except the beach. $7 per person to travel on the taxi bus to and from the beach, totaling $28 to go there and travel back to the ship and $20 for 2 chairs and an umbrella. We swam, soaked up the sun and ate at the beach restaurant/bar. After the beach, some time shopping in town.
Avg. cost for a bucket of beer (6) for $20. My special drink(frozen strawberry dacquiri)-$8
Rich’s beach massage: $40.
Day 4:
Antigua
Early morning arrival. No excursion planned and another day spent at the beach, eating at the beach bar and the same cost as it was in St. Kitts.
NOTE: Food at the beach restaurants, depending what you order is anywhere from $8-$40. A hamburger runs $15, chicken fingers around $8.
Terri’s beach massage: $25 for ½ hr. (plus tip)
Day 5:
St. Lucia
Rich and I decided to join our friends for an excursion ($109 per person) to the Pitons on the Spanish Galleon ship with our new friends from Florida, Rick, Vicki, Jimmy and Marty. We sailed to the Pitons and exited in a town called Soufrier, where we travelled by bus up the hill for a true local fare luncheon and then to the hot mineral springs and Sulphur mud baths (from the inactive volcano). Rick and I were the only ones who went into the mineral pools and got plastered with the mud. Both the mineral springs, natural and heated by the volcano, and the mud are supposed to be so good for your skin. To be honest, I thought my skin would burn off when I entered the mineral pool. It was hot!!! 100 degrees Fahrenheit. We then plastered ourselves with the Sulphur mud and our host “decorated” us with a darker mud.
We rinsed, but only in the mineral springs. Our host told us not to rinse any further until we went for a swim on the way home, AND we were instructed to leave the mud on our faces in case we had a judging contest for who has the most interesting “mask”. Also, you’ll see pictures below.
On the way back on the galleon, we had the opportunity to swim, snorkel off the boat. Fun, refreshing and I could rinse off my face! Thankfully!
Day 6:
Barbados
Another day at the beach for Rich and me. Let me tell you, this beach was the best I experience the entire trip with the softest, whitest sand and the most beautiful water. All water in the Caribbean is of a quality you’ve never experienced before. Crystal clear waters, beautiful blue, green and turquoise colors. Wow! But, Barbados beaches are in a class by themselves. Sand all the way into the water….no pebbles or rocks of any kind to step into or over like other beaches, just the softest sand you’ve ever felt. This was probably the hottest day of the trip, as well.
Again, bucket of beer: $20; frozen fruity drink: $8; 2 beach chairs and an umbrella: $20; fish fingers(2): $16; Cost to get to the beach: $7 per person (total $28 to and from beach-2 people)
Day 7:
Sea Day
This was a day of relaxation. Rich and I ate, spent time on the deck, sunning ourselves and watching the pool activities, including a belly flop competition, and listening to the music. I did a little reading. We ate lunch at the Windjammer. Rich went to watch some football with Rick. I explored the upper decks with the wave pool and the rock climbing walls.
After dinner with our friends that night, we went to the show with Claudio, an 80’s and 90’s trivia show, and then to a show at the Arcadia theatre, singing and dancing in the show “Once upon a time”.
These shows were spectacular and fun. Afterward, we had to go back and pack our bags to put outside of our cabin by 11 a.m. I made it with 15 minutes to spare. WHEW!
Day 8:
Disembarked back to Puerto Rico. Rich and I took the taxi back to our hotel at the Sheraton in old San Juan, where we stayed the previous Saturday night to Sunday. Left our baggage and explored the San Cristobal, the largest Spanish fortress in old San Juan. The other fortress, which we have explored in past years is El Morro, walked around town for some shopping and further exploring, including the park known as dove park, where the doves are fed and will perch on your arm to feed directly from your palm. We didn’t do this, though. Rich said they carry too many diseases.
Rested and then dinner at Puerto Criollo.
This morning, we had the most wonderful breakfast at 352 Guest House. It was wonderful and we recommend both of these places for your dining enjoyment.
Another fun fact about PR. Most shops close down on Mondays. This is their regular day off, instead of Sunday because there are many tourists still in town on Sundays.
All in all, we spent the following on the boat, taking off the $250 credit we received:
We didn’t get the drink package, which saved us quite a bit of $.
Excursions; a few alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks, which were about $12 per drink, or beer for $6; ice cream;
You can always check out Royal Caribbean’s website at rcl.com.
A little information about the castles in San Juan. Two forts were built by the Spanish to defend the island against land and sea attackers. El Morro was built to defend against sea attackers and SanCristobal was later built to defend against land attackers. Fort constructions began in 1539. Eventually, the Spanish ended up relinquishing Puerto Rico to the United States upon imminent attack in the Spanish/American war in 1898. If you would like to learn more about the history of Puerto Rico and how it became a territory of the US, go to https://www.nps.gov.
Until next trip or adventures, happy travelling, fellow travel gurus and adventurers!
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